Morocco’s Head of Government, Saad Eddine El Othmani, has warned the militias of the separatist Polisario Front that the Moroccan Royal Armed Forces (FAR) are on the lookout for any provocation.
“Our Royal Armed Forces will be on the lookout if you ever attempt to trespass the Moroccan borders,” El Othmani said on Sunday during a meeting of the Justice and Development Party (PJD).
The head of government and PJD’s secretary-general considered Polisario’s recent hostile acts in Guerguerat, near the Moroccan-Mauritanian border, as resulting from the “successive defeats of the separatist group.”
Read also: Timeline of Polisario’s November 13 Escalation in Guerguerat
According to El Othmani, the local and international diplomatic defeats of the Polisario Front, along with the diplomatic, social, and economic breakthroughs of Morocco in Western Sahara, “have turned them into bandits.”
In contrast, Morocco has a high degree of patience, El Othmani said. Before launching a military operation to restore the flow of traffic through the Guerguerat crossing point, Morocco notified the UN about Polisario’s hostile acts and violations.
“Polisario went too far in their tyranny and exceeded all limits. It was necessary to intervene to deter them,” the head of government declared.
“Morocco wants a political solution [to the Western Sahara issue] and has no problem with dialogue and negotiations, but it cannot accept provocations and attacks on its territories,” he added.
Read also: Morocco Mobilizes Army in Guerguerat in Response to Polisario’s Provocations
El Othmani highlighted the importance of Morocco’s military intervention in Guerguerat, saying the operation “is a strategic shift that will have a great positive impact in the future, because the road will not be blocked again.”
“Movement through the Guerguerat border crossing is not only important for Morocco, but is also important for African countries, especially Mauritania,” he said.
The head of government recalled that prior to its military defeat, the separatist Polisario Front suffered a series of diplomatic defeats, notably when 16 countries decided to open diplomatic representations in Morocco’s southern provinces.
“The opening of consulates general in the Sahara was a severe blow for the separatists, because they were under the illusion that no state recognizes the ‘Moroccanness’ of the Sahara.”
